February 7, 2010

No, certainly not the memory of George W. Bush. I am sure that more and more people are missing him and his relatively benign governance.

Certainly they miss the fact that he was a leader and a decider..especially after living under the incompetence of the Pantload-in-Chief and clueless band of merry men we have now. I am sure that he would be welcome back if for only having the good grace of staying out of our faces and off our TVs 24-7. It seems that one cannot turn to any media outlet without seeing that bony-faced, purple-lipped pontificating prevaricator talking -- always talking. One hopes that this coming November and a November two years from now, the American public will deliver him a big Sierra Tango Foxtrot Uniform message.

The day that bony-assed, metro-sexual, wuss starts disappearing in the public's rear view mirror cannot come soon enough for me.

We tire of this guy more quickly than we did before. His act is getting old.

Mark Steyn and Hugh Hewitt arrived at the conclusion that Obama -- whose chief talent seems to be just giving speeches -- is devaluing his worth with each lip-flap. Throw in stunners like his arrogant and incorrect scolding of the Supreme Court justices at the SOTU and his recent mispronunciation of corpsman as "corpse-man" (thrice, fer crissakes) and one has the rhetorical equivalent of the Wiemar republic's printing presses.

But that does not stop him. He is out there 24/7/365, endlessly bleating the same inanities on every media outlet available to him. At this rate, two things fill me with dread: (1) he'll start turning up on those ubiquitous gas station pump TV devices, blathering away about the energy crisis and (2) when he does finally get tossed out into the dust and dreck of Pennsylvania Avenue, he will embark on a farewell speech tour that will make Bill Clinton's grasping attempt o remain in the public conscience pale in comparison.

Or, perhaps an even more terrifying thought: what if some benighted fools start erecting bulletin boards with him asking if we miss him yet?

February 5, 2010

The unadjusted unemployment figures for January came out today and it is reported that the rate declined to 9.7 percent which would seemingly be good news save for the fact that gthere are some anomalies in the underlying numbers.

The labor department made the following points about their job numbers, which should be considered in anticipation of the ubiquitous gleeful White house pronouncements:

Construction employment declined by 75,000 in January, with nonresidential specialty trade contractors (-48,000) accounting for the majority of the decline. Since December 2007, employment in construction has fallen by 1.9 million.

In January, transportation and warehousing employment fell by 19,000, due to a large job loss among couriers and messengers (-23,000).

Employment in manufacturing was little changed in January (11,000). After experiencing steep job losses earlier in the recession, employment declines moderated considerably in the second half of 2009. In January, job gains in motor vehicles and parts (23,000) and plastics and rubber products (6,000) offset small job losses elsewhere in the industry.

In January, temporary help services added 52,000 jobs. Since reaching a low point in September 2009, temporary help services employment has risen by 247,000.

Health care employment continued to trend up in January. Ambulatory health care services added 15,000 jobs over the month.

In January, the federal government added 33,000 jobs, including 9,000 temporary positions for Census 2010. Employment in state and local governments, excluding education, continued to trend down.

The last is significant and bears repeating: 33,000 new fed workers of which 9,000 are temporary. Oh yeah, that'll do it. Break out the Cooke's, put the Merlot on ice, lay in a supply of pork rinds, we've turned the corner!

It’s not as bad as people feared, but it’s not really good news, either. The bounce in retail suggests that people may be ready to spend, but the declines in most other areas show that there are still fewer of them who can.

Update: This passage seems like a key to understanding why the rate dropped:

In January, the number of persons unemployed due to job loss decreased by 378,000 to 9.3 million. Nearly all of this decline occurred among permanent job losers. (See table A-11.)

The number of long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks and over) continued to trend up in January, reaching 6.3 million. Since the start of the recession in December 2007, the number of long-term unemployed has risen by 5.0 million. (See table A-12.)

As before, shrinking the denominator of the population of jobseekers has the same effect as increasing the nominator of people holding jobs — it decreases the ratio of unemployment to the population. Also, according to this chart, December’s losses got adjusted to 150,000, not 73,000. We’re still trending downward.

Also, a hat tip to Hot Air poster Todler, who provides this quote form CNN:

The U.S. economy lost 20,000 jobs in January, but the unemployment rate fell to 9.7%, according to a government report released Friday.

The Labor Department said the economy continued to shed jobs, even as economists surveyed by Briefing.com had expected a net gain of 15,000 jobs in December.

The unemployment rate fell to 9.7% in January, much lower than economists’ forecasts of 10%. It is the lowest rate since August.

The Labor Department also released an annual revision of U.S. payrolls on Friday, using data that wasn’t initially available. Losses for 2009 alone came to 4.8 million jobs, more than 600,000 more than previously estimated. The revision showed the economy has lost 8.4 million jobs since the start of the recession in December 2007 — 1.4 million more job losses than initially reported.

The payroll number for December was revised to a net loss of 150,000 jobs. The government had previously indicated that 85,000 jobs were lost in December.

The only way we lost more jobs in January and had a lower unemployment number is a MASSIVE increase in “discouraged” workers, Todler correctly observed.

Also, someone in the Purple-lipped Prevaricator's staff has been hacking the definition of "Employed American, me thinks.

February 2, 2010

Orwell's 1984 featured an oppressive, socialistic, statist government who regularly reworked history -- revising past pronouncements to fit current policy -- and saw to it that all references to the old order was erased from memory.

Now word is out that this Reuters article appearing on Yahoo is in the process of being pulled/suppressed by the White House. Here it is in its entirety before Winston shoves it down the memory hole. Oh yeah, emphasis added:

Backdoor taxes to hit middle class Mon Feb 1, 4:09 PMBy Terri CullenNEW YORK (Reuters.com) --The Obama administration's plan to cut more than $1 trillion from the deficit over the next decade relies heavily on so-called backdoor tax increases that will result in a bigger tax bill for middle-class families.

In the 2010 budget tabled by President Barack Obama on Monday, the White House wants to let billions of dollars in tax breaks expire by the end of the year -- effectively a tax hike by stealth.

While the administration is focusing its proposal on eliminating tax breaks for individuals who earn $250,000 a year or more, middle-class families will face a slew of these backdoor increases.

The targeted tax provisions were enacted under the Bush administration's Economic Growth and Tax Relief Reconciliation Act of 2001. Among other things, the law lowered individual tax rates, slashed taxes on capital gains and dividends, and steadily scaled back the estate tax to zero in 2010.

If the provisions are allowed to expire on December 31, the top-tier personal income tax rate will rise to 39.6 percent from 35 percent. But lower-income families will pay more as well: the 25 percent tax bracket will revert back to 28 percent; the 28 percent bracket will increase to 31 percent; and the 33 percent bracket will increase to 36 percent. The special 10 percent bracket is eliminated.

Investors will pay more on their earnings next year as well, with the tax on dividends jumping to 39.6 percent from 15 percent and the capital-gains tax increasing to 20 percent from 15 percent. The estate tax is eliminated this year, but it will return in 2011 -- though there has been talk about reinstating the death tax sooner.

Millions of middle-class households already may be facing higher taxes in 2010 because Congress has failed to extend tax breaks that expired on January 1, most notably a "patch" that limited the impact of the alternative minimum tax. The AMT, initially designed to prevent the very rich from avoiding income taxes, was never indexed for inflation. Now the tax is affecting millions of middle-income households, but lawmakers have been reluctant to repeal it because it has become a key source of revenue.

Without annual legislation to renew the patch this year, the AMT could affect an estimated 25 million taxpayers with incomes as low as $33,750 (or $45,000 for joint filers). Even if the patch is extended to last year's levels, the tax will hit American families that can hardly be considered wealthy -- the AMT exemption for 2009 was $46,700 for singles and $70,950 for married couples filing jointly.

Middle-class families also will find fewer tax breaks available to them in 2010 if other popular tax provisions are allowed to expire. Among them:

* Taxpayers who itemize will lose the option to deduct state sales-tax payments instead of state and local income taxes;

* The $250 teacher tax credit for classroom supplies;

* The tax deduction for up to $4,000 of college tuition and expenses;

* Individuals who don't itemize will no longer be able to increase their standard deduction by up to $1,000 for property taxes paid;

* The first $2,400 of unemployment benefits are taxable, in 2009 that amount was tax-free.

There's some really cold, hard stuff in the article (and in the underlying expiring tax cuts). Every day, in every way, this purple-lipped, whistling tooth sack of shit (yes, I said sack of shit) and his cronies in the Congress need to get thrown out of office along with the rest of the blood-sucking parasites in the federal bureaucracy.

Hey, GOP, you looking for a good contract with America theme? Well, here's a good start.